Utah Phillips, RIP

[The Elderly Kid]

I just learned that Bruce "Utah" Phillips died last Friday. Phillips was a great folksinger and nobody ever loved the West or the railroads more. His song "The Goodnight-Loving Trail" was one of the greatest Western songs of all time. His politics were radical - he was an anarchist and a Wobbly, a romantic stance to take in the late 20th century. When Johnny Cash asked to record some of his songs, Bruce agonized over it but decided against it, though it would have made him well-off. He figured that the real winner would be the recording industry, which he considered evil. "I wasn't going to feed that dragon," he used to say. He said that Cash was a perfect gentleman and never tried to coerce him, though with his wealth and connections he certainly could have. We've lost yet another great American original.

[Curley Cole]

And of course "Moose Turd Pie"

RIP

curley